Kelowna machete attack victim points finger at man arrested for stabbing ex-girlfriend | iNFOnews | Thompson-Okanagan's News Source
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Kelowna machete attack victim points finger at man arrested for stabbing ex-girlfriend

Matt LeBlanc was assaulted by two men with machetes in Ben Lee Park on Aug. 8, 2016. He says one of the men is the suspect in another stabbing that happened in Rutland Aug. 16.
Image Credit: Contributed

"I WAS TRAUMATIZED. BLOOD WAS SPRAYING EVERYWHERE."

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KELOWNA – Matt LeBlanc was at the Ben Lee skate park when two men with machetes attacked him. They knocked him to the ground, stomped his ribs and slashed his leg and face.

LeBlanc, 22, says it was the same man who was arrested this week for allegedly stabbing a 26-year-old girl in the back with a decorative knife.

Police say Derrick Antoine, 29, allegedly assaulted a girl on Franklyn Road just before 6 a.m. Aug. 16. LeBlanc says the two were a common-law couple living at the Franklyn Road apartment up until their break up in June.

“He’s just a jealous guy,” LeBlanc says. “I heard he was looking for me and he even took the sim card out of her phone and put it in his phone. He sent me text messages trying to arrange a meeting pretending he was her because he knew we were hanging out.”

LeBlanc then received a call from the same number and he says it was Antoine.

“He said ‘Matt you fucked up.’ I’m going to come to your house and fuck you up,” LeBlanc says. “I just let him go off and eventually I just hung up.”

Shortly after midnight on Aug. 8, LeBlanc and some friends were at Ben Lee Park in Rutland when he says Antoine and another man finally found him.

“They walked up to my two friends yelling ‘where’s Matt?’ They push me down onto my back and start hitting me with machetes. They both had machetes. One was serrated. (Antoine) starts digging the blade into my face and almost cut my earlobe off. They kicked me in the ribs, stomped my ribs, as soon as I stopped moving they stopped and left.”

LeBlanc was rushed to Kelowna General Hospital where he was put under general anesthetic and sewn up. The gash to his face, only centimeters from his left eye, required 30 stitches.

"I was traumatized. Blood was spraying everywhere,” he says. “I was in a lot of pain.”

Although Antoine is currently in custody for assaulting his ex-girlfriend, charges have yet to be laid for the Ben Lee Park attack, Const. Jesse O'Donaghey says, adding that the investigation is ongoing.

LeBlanc calls the lack of charges "unjustifiable."

“They know it’s the same guy. I’ve told them multiple times."

Derrick Kurtis Antoine, 29, was arrested for allegedly stabbing his 26-year-old ex-girlfriend on Franklyn Road in Rutland just before 6 a.m. on Aug. 16. A witness close to the victim says the two were dating for several years but had broken up recently and that he is also responsible for a machete attack on Matt LeBlanc in Ben Lee park weeks prior.
Derrick Kurtis Antoine, 29, was arrested for allegedly stabbing his 26-year-old ex-girlfriend on Franklyn Road in Rutland just before 6 a.m. on Aug. 16. A witness close to the victim says the two were dating for several years but had broken up recently and that he is also responsible for a machete attack on Matt LeBlanc in Ben Lee park weeks prior.
Image Credit: Facebook

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